Male and Female (1919)

"Male and Female" by Cecil B. DeMille

Cecil B. DeMille started his career in the arts as a theater actor. He did this from 1900 to 1912 until he eventually lost interest. His interest instead turned to the new world of film. Although he had absolutely no filmmaking experience, he was hired as a stage director for Lasky Feature Play Company, which would eventually grow to become Paramount Pictures in 1927. DeMille and the other members of the Lasky Feature Play Company ventured out to California to set up their new studio. While other major film studios were filming their movies in Edendale, DeMille and the LFPC decided to set up shop in Hollywood in 1913. Little did they know, their location selection would go on to become the largest industrial center for the film making industry in history. 

After a string of somewhat successful films, DeMille's "Male and Female" in 1919 would make him one of America's successful film directors, behind only D.W. Griffith. The film star, Gloria Swanson, would go on to become a massive silent film star. Her notoriety is perhaps best known today for her performance in Billy Wilder's 1950 film "Sunset Boulevard." In the film, Swanson stars as a spoiled rich girl whose family becomes shipwrecked on a deserted island. There, the family's butler, Crichton, becomes the leader of the group, as he is the only one who knows how to survive on the island. Because of the family's enormous wealth back home, they do not have the skills necessary to cook, hunt, gather, etc. The film plays as a critique of class dynamics. When a societal blank slate is introduced, it is those who are resourceful whom become the powerful class. 

As far as direction goes, DeMille plays it fairly simple. The only DeMillian scenes shot in the film are fantasy scenes involving Crichton and Gloria Swanson's characters in a Babylonian setting. Since DeMille is known for his visual set design excesses, this scene is the closest we come to what DeMille's films would come to be known for. 

Writing this in 2023, this writing notes the similarities between this film and the contemporary film "Triangle of Sadness" by Rueben Ostlund. Like in "Male and Female," Ostlund's film sees a group of wealthy elites trapped on an island with no skills of surviving. Also like in DeMille's film, "Triangle of Sadness" also demonstrates how the skilled laborers/the help become the dominating power in the newly formed social structures.